


The Art of Growing Up

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon, Child Abuse, Drama, Fluff, No Slash, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-05-20
Updated: 2005-05-20
Packaged: 2018-12-27 12:16:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12080895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: A sort-of-something-like-a-prequel toExistentialism, though either piece could be read on their own.They ended going back to Justin's house, crawling up into his bedroom window instead of taking the front door. There was no reason they couldn't; Mr. and Mrs. Taylor had both known where Justin was going, and it was only nearing one. It just seemed more exciting, more forbidden. Just like the second before Brian remembers kissing Justin felt like.





	The Art of Growing Up

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

He remembers a lot of things about Justin. Remembers the day they met. The first day of grade six - he sat down in the desk next to the weird looking blond kid, and introduced himself with the only set of manners an eleven year old could manage. He remembers Justin had looked kind of sick with 'the new kid' syndrome when he had introduced himself, barely forced a smile as Brian sat in the desk next to his and pretty much decided they'd be working on their assignment together. He remembers it was a pirate map, and what the teacher wanted a bunch of sixth graders to do with a pirate map Brian still doesn't really understand. All he knows for sure is that he remembers sitting in Justin's backyard, on this rickety old bench that he guessed had been there for at least a thousand years, watching as his new best friend drew gold coins with a yellow colored pencil and gave the pirate they'd dubbed as their teacher's secret twin brother an eye patch. He remembers that year pretty vividly. They'd make fun of poor Mr. Sanderson because when he talked a lot he'd get these dribbles of spit in the corners of his mouth, and sometimes he'd end up spitting on the kids in the front row without even knowing it. 

The year after that, Brian remembers being part of the popular kids - that typical middle school clique. The summer between sixth grade and seventh grade had been pretty uneventful. He remembers watching a lot of TV, sprawled across the couch in Justin's living room, complaining about the heat and thinking of excuses to feed Mrs. Taylor as to why they couldn't go outside, "like the other kids." He remembers laying in a sleeping bag on Justin's bedroom floor most nights, because even though he'd never really said it out loud or told anyone, they both knew Mr. Kinney was scary, and that Brian would rather spend his days at the Taylor's residence then at his own. Brian remembers the sickly green glow-in-the-dark stars that stuck to Justin's ceiling, and how they'd make up stories about aliens and different universes and then even though he wouldn't admit it, Brian would get scared at the idea of being abducted, and he'd crawl into Justin's bed and steal most of the blankets from him. Justin never complained though cause he always got hot, and Brian was always cold anyways. 

It was the first week in September that things really started to change. Brian went back to school shopping with his Mom, and she bought him the latest style of shoes and the coolest type of jeans. He remembers going to Justin's house the first morning of school and eating pancakes that Mrs. Taylor made. He remembers watching Mr. Taylor read the paper, and listening to Molly complain that she didn't want to take her pink back pack to school anymore - that she really needed a new one this year and that her Mom was being so mean because she wouldn't buy her a new one, but Justin got a new one because he was in middle school. Brian remembers watching as Justin rolled his eyes and hid behind his stack of pancakes.

They walked to school together, the first day of seventh grade. Justin talked the whole time, going on about trivial things while Brian pretended he couldn't hear the group of girls behind them, giggling and whispering and doing all the other gross things that pre-teen girls did. He remembers crossing his fingers as the two of them looked over that year's class arrangements, hoping that he and Justin got into the same class so they could make another map, maybe this time something concerning Egypt because mummies were pretty cool, only this one would be better then last year's - cause they were a year older and had a lot more wisdom and stuff. He remembers Justin had been a faster reader then him, still was, and had figured out they were in the same class before Brian did. They smiled at each other and promised they'd be each other's partners for the annual seventh grade camping trip, and then they walked into the classroom together. And that's when it changed.

Seventh Grade had been a lot of things for Brian. As September turned into October and then November and December, he felt a little older and... more mature then Justin. He remembers being kind of embarrassed when he introduced Justin to his new group of friends, laughing awkwardly when Justin tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and blushed. They were camping partners that year, but just because they had been assigned to each other - Brian would have rather gone with Mark Jackson, but by that point he and Justin were kind of a package deal. He remembers watching Justin get sick from staying in the damp weather and not wanting to be stuck in the same tent as that weird Taylor kid. That's what everyone else called him, at least. They went down to the river one day on that camping trip, and as they walked down a particularly muddy slope, Justin slipped and slid at least three feet down, getting mud all up his back and in his hair. Brian blushed and pretended he didn't notice.

And that's pretty much how it went, until Justin left in the ninth grade. He went to some private school, Brian doesn't really remember the details. He just knows that when his Mom told him, he hadn't talked to Justin properly in months. He didn't see him at the pool parties he attended and movies he went to every Friday night with his friends. Justin was just that weird and artsy kid that everybody just kind of forgot about after a while. He kind of disappeared into the shadows and Brian continued to steal the spotlight. They talked every once in a while. Justin would phone every couple of months, and sometimes they'd go and get dinner at a fast food place. The conversations were always awkward, and this one time Brian's then-girlfriend came into the diner with a couple of other kids from his grade, and he would have rather slid under the table then face them. Justin had seemed oblivious. He'd played with the straw in his drink and poked at his hamburger, because when Justin went to the bathroom while Brian ordered, he'd forgot to tell him he was a vegetarian. And even when he did, Brian didn't really seem to care. It seemed like it had been longer then three years since they were sharing blankets and making up stories about being abducted by aliens.

He doesn't really remember the few months that followed those days. They were a haze of parties and drinking and learning how to drive. He remembers he didn't really enjoy those months, told himself the entire time that these were normal things to do as he grew up, like rites of passage. Like the same way his Dad hitting him while he was growing up had been, and how he'd sometimes have to hold his Mom's hair back as she puked up the previous nights alcohol. Sometimes he still had to do that, only now he could fight back where his Dad was concerned, and some days he could ignore his Mom's pleading and sometimes (always) yelling. But that was the summer between ninth and tenth grade - forgotten were the stacks of pancakes and well, Justin. In general, Justin.

So when he picked up the phone one day, sometime in early September, and heard his voice, Brian remembers he had been kind of stunned. It was a little deeper then he remembered, and he knew that Justin was thinking the same thing about him. They talked about nothing for a while - haven't heard from you in a while, congratulations on your basketball team ranking first place in the finals - and then the awkward strain had turned into laughter and Brian remembers asking if he wanted to go for a walk or something. Anything. 

Over time Brian started blowing off his friends more and more. _Sorry, my Mom's making me do this lame family thing this weekend._ Broke up with his girl. _It's not you, it's me._ He'd skip his last class to drive the half hour to Justin's private art school on the other side of town just to pick him up. _No, it wasn't out of my way._ He'd lie to his parents so he could go to the mall with Justin and make fun of the kids that came in and out of the Gap with bags of baby blue and pink and yellow and whatever else was popular at the time. _I got this big date tonight with Stephanie Gomez, you know her right Dad? Yeah, she's pretty hot._

Brian remembers Winter of the year he was in tenth grade. His friends had stopped phoning and complaining that he never did stuff with them anymore. His ex had stopped starting rumors about the size of his dick because, well Brian still doesn't really know why. He remembers spending a lot of time with Justin. Going to the mall every weekend, and blowing the fifty dollars he made every two weeks bagging groceries at the local market on cheap sparklers and CDs. He remembers walking home in the dark even if it was only five-thirty at night, laughing and falling into ditches. Not because he was drunk, but because Justin really did make him laugh that hard, all knees buckled and stomach muscles impossibly weak. He remembers at Christmas time they'd go to the department store and make fun of the cheesy tinsel and decorations that people just seemed to buy by the crate, and the time Justin fell against a display of light up Santas and knocked it over. He remembers running so fast he thought his knee caps would fall off because even though he wasn't sure, he had a pretty good idea of how expensive the accident would end up being. He just remembers laughing a lot that Winter, because Justin always made everything funny until his cheeks ached and tears were running down the sides of his face.

He remembers that he spent Christmas Day at Justin's Grandma's house, because he didn't know where his parents were. He pretended he didn't care and pretended not to notice that even then Justin knew that was a lie. He remembers Christmas dinner at Justin's Aunt's house, and how Mrs. Taylor treated Brian as a son, even after it was obvious Brian had been a less then stellar friend for the last couple of years. Jennifer had laughed, hand over her mouth when Brian said if he ate any more he would puke, and then the whole table had erupted into chuckles when Justin elbowed him and stated he could totally stomach another spoonful of mashed potatoes. Brian had scoffed and complained the whole time Justin served him another three mounds of the stuff, but he ate two more pieces of pie after that anyway, so really it didn't matter.

It snowed that night, Brian remembers sticking out his tongue to catch the snowflakes that fell from the sky and laughing as he and Justin slipped down the driveway, shoes barely sticking to slicked cement. They held onto each other, giggling like mad with arms wrapped around waists and fingers touching hips as Mr. and Mrs. Taylor pretended they couldn't see what was actually happening. Brian spent the night on top of Justin's bed, smiling and warm as he watched Justin play the new game console his parents had got him for his Christmas present. He remembers laying on the mattress and watching the ceiling, counting the slightly yellowed spots where the stars of his childhood used to stick as he listened to Justin complain when he died and gloat when he advanced the level. He remembers Mrs. Taylor knocking and then poking her head around the opened door, whispering that she was going to bed and that they shouldn't stay up too late because they were going to Aunt Meredith's place for leftovers the next day. Justin had nodded and waved her off without taking his eyes from the TV screen as she said her goodnights to the both of them. He stayed up another three hours playing his game as Brian drifted in and out of sleep, still fully dressed as his eyelids got heavy and breathing slowed down to a sleepy, relaxed rhythm. 

When the mattress caved in a bit at the bottom Brian remembers waking up, turning his head to the side to read the digital clock with bleary eyes. He still didn't understand how Justin could stay up until three in the morning playing video games about some fucking hobbit or something, and then wake up five hours later and be completely well rested and awake. Brian remembers thinking he could sleep for a week straight and still wake up with a scowl on his face. Justin had crawled across the mattress and flopped down with as much grace as a fifteen year old could possess, and that's all that Brian remembers because then he fell back asleep.

New Years Eve had been strange that year. His Mom was celebrating it with her tennis instructor while his Dad did the big countdown at some seedy bar about ten minutes from their house. Brian remembers sitting alone on the couch in his living room, staring at the blank TV screen because they couldn't afford cable anymore, and pressing the bruises on his wrists that were leftovers from Christmas - present from his Dad, as he told Justin on the day after they appeared. They had gotten darker and more yellow as the days progressed, and on the thirty first they had started to turn purple and black. Justin had used them as color palettes for his term project, and that was the excuse he had used when he showed up at ten to midnight. _I have a problem. I need a shade of purple that is not the color of Molly's bedroom walls. Let me see your wrists._

Brian remembers smiling and cringing only a little bit when his lip - Happy New Years Brian, Love Dad - had split open just a little bit more. 

The clock in the kitchen buzzed when midnight hit, but neither of them had celebrated much. Justin was worried Mr. Kinney was going to come home, and Brian was hoping he wouldn't. Brian remembers Justin was always terrified of his Dad, and one of the reasons why was probably because the only time he'd ever hear about the guy was when he was getting drunk and punching Brian's bottom lip open. When it was five minutes into the New Year, Brian remembers breaking the silence with some story about how he didn't really remember the year before because he was too high to realize what day it was, much less take note of the changing year. Justin had laughed awkwardly and Brian had felt like he was in seventh grade again and pretending he didn't know the almost-albino kid with the weird smile, except now it was his past that was the awkward silences and Justin turned into his way out.

They ended going back to Justin's house, crawling up into his bedroom window instead of taking the front door. There was no reason they couldn't; Mr. and Mrs. Taylor had both known where Justin was going, and it was only nearing one. It just seemed more exciting, more forbidden. Just like the second before Brian remembers kissing Justin felt like.

He remembers the moment that ticked by before he did it. His feet had just touched the carpet of Justin's floor, and he was still laughing after Justin told him this story about how his Mom forced him to be friends with this mentally handicapped kid in second grade who couldn't talk right and had one tiny hand. In-between telling himself that he really was going to burn in hell for laughing so hard at a story like that and trying to brush the bits of tree bark out of his hair, he just leaned over and did it. Kissed him. 

And they didn't have sex. They didn't even make out, or kiss again after that first one. Brian just remembers nudging his lips a little more against Justin's, and touching the back of his neck with cold finger tips before he shifted and then took a step back, this tiny smile on his face that matched the expression across from him. After the kiss they both took off their jackets and climbed into Justin's bed, and before they fell asleep, Brian whispered about how he remembered the stars that used to stick to Justin's ceiling. He remembers Justin's soft laughter and then they told each other stories of experiences they had together: _I remember that time in grade six that you purposely packed an air bubble into your clay dish, and when Mr. Sanderson put all of the projects into the kiln, yours exploded and blew up everybody else's projects_ and _Remember the first time I came over to your house? We sat in the rain and ate chocolate ice cream, and my jeans got grass stains all over them._ Brian knows Justin left out the part about the reason they sat in the rain in the first place, and how Brian never even ended up introducing him to Jack Kinney anyways, because he never thought his Father was good enough to meet somebody like Justin.

That was high school. As grade ten turned into eleven, they days started to melt together because they all kind of seemed the same after a while. Brian remembers never knowing if it was Wednesday or Thursday unless he phoned Justin, because he'd either be at an after hours art class, or working a shift at the diner where he got hired to work as a bus boy. It never occurred to him that he could just check the calendar. He'd tell nobody he was leaving home every night, because there wasn't a soul there to hear him. He'd just make sure the front door was locked behind him and then climb into his car, going to pick Justin up from wherever he was at, so they could drive down to the beach. Brian remembers the beach really well. It was always warm in the summer and just a little cooler in the Winter. He hated Spring the most, because when they parked, there would always be two or three other cars there with steamed up windows. He doesn't remember being embarrassed though. He'd laugh and make fun of his ex-friends with Justin, because Justin was really the only one who understood him and whether that was the adolescence talking or not, Brian doesn't know. He's pretty sure Justin's still the only one who really knows him though, whether he likes it or not.

It was the May in eleventh grade when things started to change again. Brian remembers they'd been sitting on the hood of his car, splitting a pack of stolen cigarettes between them as they watched the horizon and talked about nothing in particular. Justin was going on about some new project he was working on, or maybe it was the last horrible shift he'd waded through at the diner. Brian doesn't remember Justin's exact words, he only remembers the way his eyes would focus in on the lips that were saying them and how Justin wasn't surprised at all when Brian leaned over and kissed him again. He'd laughed and Brian remembers he had to pull away long enough to tell him to shut up, except it didn't really count because he was laughing too. After he'd thrown his cigarette into the dirt, Brian had smiled and tugged on the ends of Justin's hair as he crawled on top of him, pressing his smaller body against the wind shield. He remembers the feeling of his teeth against Justin's neck, the pressure on his shoulder blades from the palms of Justin's hands.

He remembers his Dad hit him a lot more after the night he walked in on Justin, shirt off and buried under Brian as they panted and smiled and tried to catch their breaths. Brian doesn't even know - to this day - how long his Dad had ended up standing there for without the two of them noticing him, frozen in the door frame before he stormed across the room and grabbed the back of Brian's neck. Justin hadn't come back to Brian's house after that. They spent a lot of time in Justin's bedroom in the days following the one where Brian's thumb got broken, lips pressed against temples and hands flat against stomachs. Mrs. Kinney died from alcohol poisoning a week before the end of school. Neither of them went to the funeral. Brian had spent the day sitting on a rock ledge that overhung the ocean, chain smoking. He doesn't remember where Justin had been. Probably trying to find him.

Things got a little better after that. The summer before they both graduated had been different. Brian had moved out of his Dad's place, illegally because technically he wasn't an adult for another ten and a half months. Mr. Kinney had been furious, and Brian was too scared to sleep for the first few days he lived by himself. He was afraid he hadn't locked the front door properly, or that his Dad would find his address or have the police come to arrest him. Justin never told him the idea of getting arrested for moving out of his Dad's house was absurd. He'd just smoothed the hair back from Brian's face and pressed his lips against his cheek, promising to stay awake if Brian would just fall asleep. Brian remembers having a silent argument with Justin through his eyes. 

That's just kind of how it was, after that. Summer went by in a whirl of town carnivals, kissing the salt water out of Justin's mouth as they swam in the ocean, and avoiding Mr. Kinney. It wasn't that hard to do though, because he was usually passed out in a bar somewhere anyway. Brian ran into his friends sometime in mid-July, when he and Justin were only dressed in soaking wet underwear, taking running jumps off the side of the ledge and into the ocean. He found out Mark Jackson and Stephanie Gomez had been fucking since he thought he was Mark's best friend and Stephanie's boyfriend, respectively. And he also found out he didn't really care, not when Justin was floating around in the water below him with wet hair sticking to his forehead and a smile on his face. He'd made some more excuses - _Sorry, can't come to your party tonight, got things to do_ \- and didn't even bother to waste his time lying - _Actually I plan on dry humping Justin into the mattress, so no I can't come later either._ When they finally left him alone, he'd watched them walk back down the dirt road, all bare feet and tanned skin, and then he'd shouted - _Look fucking out, I'm jumping!_ \- and ran off the side of the ledge, arms above his head as he let himself free fall into the water below. He still remembers Justin's laughter when his head broke the surface of the ocean and the salt water finally dripped out of his ears.

The first time they had sex, Brian remembers being convinced that it was going to be a disaster. They'd be drunk, or high, or just not fucking there in one way or another. The Taylors had left for some lame 'rekindling the romance' vacation - Justin had found the pamphlet while looking for a Chinese take out menu one night, and they'd ended up crying they were laughing so hard, fingers clutching on to counter tops so they wouldn't get stomach cramps and end up on the floor - so Brian had spent the weekend there, at Justin's. It kind of happened by accident he realizes, looking back. One minute they'd been watching some crap film on the movie channel, the next he had his hands down Justin's pants, and the second after that his dick was up his ass. They'd fucked a lot that weekend, in fact a lot more gay sex was had then he had ever expected his life to involve. Then the Taylors' came back holding hands and laughing and Brian's dick was eternally soft for weeks after that.

Fall came, as it usually did after Summer passed, and Justin went back to his art school to graduate while Brian inched his way through the local public system. He still skipped his last class to drive across town to pick Justin up, who'd have something like a panic attack every single time just because of the fact that he was convinced Brian would end up one credit short of being able to graduate. He remembers bringing Justin back to his apartment, and he could finally sleep without being plagued by thoughts of his Father finding him and beating him to a pulp, but Justin usually stayed anyway. Just because. And Brian remembers that sometimes he'd wonder what Mr. and Mrs. Taylor thought about that, Justin spending all his time at the youngest Kinney's residence, but then he realized that he was pretty sure they'd known all along, what would happen in the end. Mrs. Taylor had at least, because honestly, Brian wasn't very surprised when she filed for divorce in October, whether they'd tried to 'rekindle their romance' or not. It was the week before Halloween and Brian remembers that Justin didn't even cry. Brian always figured that was just dads though, as a plural word. Dads were just things you got plagued with, and as far as he was concerned, there wasn't such a thing as a good one.

They spent Halloween getting drunk in Brian's bedroom, and when they woke up the next morning with pounding heads and aching temples, they'd both still managed to laugh when they found a broken Vodka bottle in the bathroom. Neither of them remembered how that had happened. Brian had a vague idea that the ripped shower curtain barely hanging from the rod might have had something to do with it, though. They'd both climbed into the bath tub, stepping over shards of glass and puddles of stale drinks, and Brian remembers laughing as Justin turned on the taps and the water sprayed everywhere. They'd stayed in the bathroom for a few hours that morning, until the hot water ran out and all the dirty clothes on the floor were soaked. 

Thanksgiving came next, and following that was another Christmas. Brian remembers they'd both been so broke that they promised they wouldn't get each other a present, because it really didn't matter anyways. They'd both smiled and groaned at the same time when Brian disappeared into his bedroom, only to come out with a present and be given one in return. Justin had drawn him a portrait of himself, mostly shaded in dark purples and yellows, and Brian had given Justin a box of glow in the dark stars. Justin had laughed and punched him in the arm, and then Brian remembers he tugged on the ends of Justin's hair and pushed on his nose with the flat of his thumb. They climbed on the couch and the table and the chairs as they stuck the stars to the ceiling, laying flat on the floor after that as the sunlight faded and they started to glow as it fell dark outside.

Sometime in-between January and March things started to change again. Justin got accepted to the New York Academy of Art, and Brian remembers that was when he started to get scared. They tried not to talk about it that much, the idea of Justin leaving, because it terrified them both. It was always, _Where are you spending Christmas next year?_ instead of, _Please don't fucking go, I need you more then I realized._ They both heard it though, always heard the _I love you_ behind the _I'll send your Christmas present in November to make sure it arrives on time._ Brian ended up seeing an obituary in the newspaper one day, Jack Kinney killed by drunk driver, and in-between the tears he was laughing because how fucking perfect - an alcoholic getting murdered by some tipsy teenager on her way back from a party. After that he started thinking about going to New York with Justin, because there was nothing holding him back after his Dad's death. He remembers the day he was planning to tell Justin that he was going with him was the day that he got called to the counselorâ€™s office at school. She had explained that he was one credit short of graduating and after the introductory sentence left her mouth, he'd just kind of phased out then, mind drifting between the idea of another year stuck in high school, or summer school, or maybe just not graduating at all. 

He didn't tell Justin for a while, cause he knew the look that would be on his face when he did. He knew Justin would tell him that he should have listened all those times he came to pick him up, that he'd end up missing too many classes and even if Brian never thought Trig 12 was that important, it was. He didn't let it slip until April, and at first Justin had thought it was an April Fool's joke - _Haha, yeah I'm sure you're not graduating this year, Brian. Me either. Isn't the fifteenth a little late for a joke? You're starting to slip, you know. You're turning into an old man faster then I anticipated_ ÂÂ- but then he looked at Brian's face and knew. He fucking knew. And all he'd said, his entire reaction to the fact that Brian was stuck in the mud (again) was just - _Oh._ Fucking _oh._ And that was that. 

At the end of April, Brian remembers Justin was practically living at his apartment when he got a call from his Mother, asking him to come back to the house for dinner that night. Turns out she and Mr. Taylor had got to talking and they'd decided to give it another try. Brian remembers the way Justin rolled his eyes while he told him that night, after he'd come back from his house and crawled into bed beside him. They'd fallen asleep pretty quickly after that, the missing credits and trips to New York and divorced-then-together parents just, forgotten. When they woke up the morning after, Brian remembers laughing and covering his eyes with his hands as Justin recalled a conversation he'd overheard - his parents in the kitchen, quietly whispering and hissing back and forth in a silent argument over the subject of male influence in Justin's life and the fact that he had pretty much moved out at that point, which they both tried blaming each other for. That morning when Justin had gone back to pick up some books, his Mom had cornered him in his bedroom, wondering about prom. Brian remembers the way Justin giggled through his words as he recalled the story, how his Mom asked if he had his tickets yet and Justin had broken the news maybe not so gently that no he didn't, and he wasn't going so it didn't matter anyway. Mrs. Taylor had asked if he wasn't going because he couldn't find a date, and Brian remembers laughing until it felt like his guts were going to spill onto the floor when Justin said that it wasn't the problem, and Mrs. Taylor had looked at him with the most serious look on her face and asked - _Brian?_ No other question, no - _Are you short of money?_ or _Are none of your other friends going?_ Just that one word, like _Oh._ Except now it wasn't _oh._ Now it was _Brian?_ And Brian laughed for damn near a week after that, every time he thought about it.

Spring turned to Summer pretty quickly. While Justin was wrapping up his last year of high school, Brian was struggling with the idea of taking four different courses over the next few months just to earn that one last fucking credit that he needed to graduate. Prom got closer and closer, and every time the subject came up, Brian remembers that Justin would just laugh it off, telling whoever he was talking to that he really, honest to God, did not want to fucking go. Mrs. Taylor tried a few more times over the next couple of weeks, and even went as far to buy two tickets with her own money - just so Justin couldn't use it as an excuse. In the end she got her way, Justin caved under the pressure and Brian remembers the complaining and the whining and the _I don't want to get fitted for my tux, I'd rather get fucked into the mattress by you._ That one had worked a bit better then the others, and at one point Brian was pretty close to just kidnapping Justin and humping him clear across the country.

The night before the prom was when it all changed. Just kind of, shifted. Brian remembers that he was trying to wade his way through some paperwork concerning his summer courses one night - go figure, everything was a little more difficult when you weren't legal yet and both your parents were dead - when his hands started itching towards his cell phone and cigarettes. Brian had leaned back in his rickety old chair, the one that secretly reminded him of the wooden bench he and Justin had drawn that fucking map on six years prior, and lit up a smoke as he debated his options. They had all somehow ended up with the same conclusion - something that started with a J and ended with an N. At that point pretty much everything had been Justin, though, so Brian hadn't been surprised or even that freaked out over the fact he was debating phoning someone he'd talked to just that morning. 

Brian remembers dialing in one of the only sets of numbers he'd been calling at the time, and resting his elbow on the table top as he waited, bouncing the cigarette between his lips and biting the end with his teeth. It had tasted terrible, like coffee and pennies. He remembers talking for a few minutes - could've been five or forty, before he had hung up and sat at the desk for a minute, finishing off his cigarette before he grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair and his keys from the living room table. That had been one of the nights he remembered the most. They'd just fucking drove, and as always it had come back to the beach. They stayed there for a while, he remembers, all hazy sunshine and warm sandy feet. He'd dropped Justin off a couple hours later, the block over from his Aunt's or Uncle's or Whothefuckever's house, smile on his face as he watched him walk away in the rear view mirror. 

The next night he remembers being surprised when Justin showed up in his bedroom, crooked smile across his face and bottle of stolen-but-not-watered-down-yet whiskey in hand. He remembers laughing and shaking his head and almost whispering as Justin crossed the room, throwing his rented tux jacket on the couch and giggling some more as he toed his shoes off. Brian had smiled and tried to play it nonchalant, like he really didn't give a shit that Justin came to spend the night getting drunk and watching the sunset instead of living through his own rite of passage. The fucking prom, and granted Justin and prom weren't two words he'd ever considered using in the same sentence, he knew it meant a lot to Mrs. Taylor which by default made it important to Justin, too. And he remembers smiling as Justin crawled into his lap, whispering softly and pretending to be overly serious as he spoke - _You promised me you'd get drunk and watch the sunset with me. Asshole._ The asshole is what cracked him though, because Brian remembers laughing and grabbing Justin around the waist as they both fell to the floor.

Mrs. Taylor wasn't really all that surprised when she found out Justin had ended up not going to prom in the end. Justin told him that she'd just rolled her eyes at him and complained about the price she paid for the tickets, and how she figured he wouldn't even end up going. Brian had snorted and tried to imitate Mrs. Taylor the best he could - he'd had six year's experience - as he made the pitch in his voice a little sharper and rolled his eyes. _Figured,_ he'd said, in his most charming I'm-making-fun-of-your-Mom-but-don't-get-mad voice, _Figured you'd be with Brian Kinney. Brian?_ And then they'd laughed a lot more after that, all inside jokes that weren't even really that funny if he stopped to think about it. So he didn't, he never stopped to think about things. He didn't think about the fact he wasn't even bothering with the thought of his own prom, just because he didn't want to face the Stephanies and the Marks and the fact that he technically wasn't even graduating so it didn't matter anyways. He didn't think about the fact that Justin was leaving the first Wednesday in September, and he probably wouldn't see him until Christmas. He didn't think about the upcoming Halloween and the birthdays and weekends he'd be alone for, not because he was trying to avoid it, but just because it made him sad. He remembers feeling fucking heart broken that Justin wasn't going to be able to test out all the Halloween masks with him, and get sick on the same too-sweet-but-sour Christmas punch, and who's parents was he going to steal alcohol from? That's when he remembers realizing that it didn't even matter about the actual booze, it was the part after - the part where they pushed and shoved at each other in front of the sink as they tried to fill the bottle back up with water, arguing over where they should fill it up to without looking suspicious. That was the part he was going to miss the most.

Brian remembers sitting in his bedroom, laying on his mattress with his eyes closed even though he wasn't really sleeping. Or anywhere near it. His mind had been racing, throwing excuses and apologizes and ideas around faster then he could even take note and remember they'd existed in the first place. He thought of the excuses first. _You can't go to New York because the air is different there and you might not be able to breathe properly._ After the excuses came the apologies. _I'm sorry I never listened to you about the credits. If I had I'd be able to leave with you and never look back._ Then came the ideas, the worst phase as far as Brian was concerned. And when something ended up sounding worse then the apologies, he knew he was fucked. Completely and utterly fucked. The ideas were all ridiculous he realizes, thinking back. _If I do a correspondence class, I can just sleep in your dorm room and if anybody notices we'll just tell them that I'm your non-identical twin brother - so technically I'm half your brain. Worth seven hundred fifty IQ points. At least._

In the end he wound up drunk with bloody knuckles from punching the holes in his bathroom wall. After he drank another half bottle of Jack Daniels, he barely remembers how he got from his apartment to Justin's house. But somehow he had managed to end up there, stuck half way up the tree outside Justin's bedroom window, because where the Taylors were concerned, influencing Justin to not go to his prom was one thing, but showing up as a younger version of his Father was definitely another. He'd somehow managed to get his foot wedged in-between a branch and the trunk of the tree, and in his drunken state, he'd figured he had two options. Throwing his alcohol bottle through the window, or falling out of said tree with only one of the two shoes he'd arrived with. So he did what he figured was the best idea. Both. The original idea of course, had been to throw his bottle against the side of the house, near Justin's window so he'd hear the thump but Brian wouldn't end up having to pay for a broken window. The way the idea was executed in the end was something entirely different. He'd tossed the bottle, only instead of hitting the side panels, it had smashed the largest sheet of glass in Justin's window. He doesn't really remember what happened next, and he figures that's pretty typical, considering he was completely bombed, and then fell out of a tree and landed on his head.

What he does remember, is waking up disoriented with an egg on the back of his head. He remembers white, which had turned out to be the kitchen ceiling of the Taylor residence - go figure, and the sound of cracking ice from a tray. It wasn't like the movies where the coma patient wakes up and wonders where he is, and it wasn't the daily soap opera plot, with memory loss and temporary amnesia only triggered by polaroids and memories. It was just Brian waking up from a bender in his boyfriend's parents' kitchen. And the first thing he remembers saying, though he voice barely worked, was - _I'll fucking kill you if you go to New York without me. I mean it._ The threatening tone had quickly disappeared with the need to cough and throw up and die all at the same time. He'd coughed as he rolled over, threw up along the way to the bathroom, and figured it was a pretty good time to die when his head was in the toilet bowl and Justin was patting his back, right between his shoulders.

Brian remembers this morning, when he woke up because the sun was shining too bright in his eyes, and Justin was having the loudest shower in the history of showers in the bathroom attached to their bedroom. He remembers groaning and complaining to nobody in particular, then pulling the blankets up over his head to attempt blocking out the sound of the New York streets outside. He remembers finally getting nagged out of bed, only to drink the lousiest cup of coffee he's pretty sure he ever had at the diner underneath their wickedly-expensive-for-such-a-terrible-location apartment. He remembers being happier then maybe ever, and laughs so hard tears run out the corner of his eyes when Justin gives him this map of New York - sketched out in colored pencils, detailing a route from their front door to the pizza place about five blocks over. Brian's never been very good at remembering things, Justin figures. Especially directions.


End file.
